Hands and Feet
by Cap Streeter
Summary: Inspired by the exchange in S2E4: "She has a headstone." "Yeah, put up by her uncle, a man we’ve never met. So you wanna go pay your respects to a slab of granite put up by a stranger?" Mary and the last time she saw the man who was far from a stranger.


_Title: **Hands and Feet**_

_Disclaimer: Don't own, because this uncle would have popped up as Steven Rattazzi or Bruce Greenwood, I think either one could do a cool, lowered talking like this guy. Stole the joke from 30 Rock, it's a funny one, if you know the joke.._

_A/N: Was inspired by this exchange in _**Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things Season 2 Episode 4**

_She has a headstone._

_Yeah, put by her uncle, a man we've never met. So you wanna go pay your respects to a slab of granite put up by a stranger? Come on._

_I feel like there is more to the story, since meeting Mary Campbell nee Winchester, there has to be a back story to the uncle. Since we're getting a season 6 he could show up, right? Also would love a Supernatural beta, just holy run-on sentences Batman.  
_

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At the age of 15 and 11, Joseph and Mary Campbell learned they were not brother and sister. Joseph Campbell was in fact Samuel Campbell's youngest brother by many years. Due to the hunter lifestyle not being conductive to a long life span Samuel and Deanna took him into their home a month after they were married, he was not even seven months old. Mary followed a few years later, quiet and calm to Joseph's loud and rowdy. They may have been uncle and niece but were raised as siblings.

As such everyone cooed over the Campbell siblings. With names like Mary and Joseph they had already heard every single cheesy joke from preachers and demons and everyone in between. They did not care, they were the Campbell children, and they could kick your ass.

So when one non-descript day the truth was learned, life was never the same. There were fights, anger, the last one the day after Joseph's 18th birthday which resulted in a packed bag, slammed screen door, threats that started with 'You walk out that door…' and ending with promises of never coming back.

He did not keep the promise and arrived two days after a Yellow-Eyed Demon killed his eldest brother and wife, the people who he still thought of and called Mom and Dad.

A woman who was kind but nervous came with him, she helped with the set-up of the wake and even if Samuel and Deanna Campbell were not pillars of the town, people seemed to know that they had lost something. That even though the preachers claimed they protected the town and their well being, the denizens of the town knew who the real shepherds were.

Following the services Mary and John in the Impala, Joe and his nervous girl in his Ford, went back to their parent's house. They sat for awhile eventually John offered his arm to the nervous woman, leaving the two to grieve, share memories and probably get drunk off the reminder of the liquor cabinet.

Instead Joe and Mary looked at one another; they had a familial obligation to attend to.

"You got the salt?"

"Yeah."

They took the pick-up truck to the cemetery that was on the outskirts of town, it was down an old back road to the middle of Old Lady Forrester's corn field.

The dirt was still loose from the burial earlier.

Joe pulled out a flask and took a pull then offered it silently to Mary. So they were sort of doing the traditional thing; she could tell this was her father's.

"Jamison's?" she asked feeling the tell-tale smooth burn.

"Yeah," he said.

"He'd be pissed because it's not on the rocks," she said. "You know how he lectured us on water helped it to breathe."

"I put some holy water in," he said with a smile.

Mary couldn't help it, she started laughing. This was her life, her weird, freakish, strange life, the only one she knew. Other people would just cut it with water, but her family would use holy water and upon closer inspection of the flask of course it was made of iron and had an exorcism spell on it.

"I think this was supposed to hold holy water brother," she said handing it back to him.

"Holds whiskey just as well," he said taking another pull.

"You do know he used holy water to make his ice cubes."

"When did he start doing that?"

"Just after you left."

There was an awkward pause, Joe did not just leave the house, he went off and joined the Navy. Even though he could be assigned to a boat going down a river through Vietnam, constantly looking for and hunting Charlie. But he was raised in this family; he knew better, he knew it was always possible some unknown thing was just waiting to kill him. While war was scary, the family business was far scarier.

It turned out fine, he was assigned to the Mediterranean, he told his family that non-descript day and Samuel yelled that once he left, Joe could never come back. Joe thought that sounded fine by him. So it went, but he was back, he knew he'd be back at least once for this but he did not think this soon.

"And how many demons did he catch?"

"None, I'm pretty sure but it used to drive Mom nuts."

"I bet."

"Not as much as her habit to listen to Robert Johnson, you know how much Dad disliked the guy for messing around with that demon."

"Mom would always say, 'Well he sure could play guitar, Sam-uel,' and draw out his name," he said offering the flask.

"Then of course he'd say, 'That's because the fool sold his soul to a demon, Deanna.'"

"Followed by an even longer argument until eventually they got to what was really bugging them," she said and then took another sip.

"Did you know they had make-up sex after every argument?"

Mary choked on the whiskey, it burned as she coughed.

"Careful there little sister, don't take too much," he said trying not to laugh.

"You jerk, I was drinking. Also gross, never needed to know that… and just how the hell did you know that?"

"Dad basically told me," he said watching her take a drink. "After I walked in on them."

Mary almost choked again, "You're doing that on purpose."

Joe just gave her an innocent smile.

"Bastard."

"Ass."

There was another silence as they just looked at their parent's graves, the holy water container that was now a holy flask passed between them.

"Alright I think I can do it now," he said draining the last of the whiskey.

They set to digging as so many times before. Doing the job they were raised in, the job that took away his two sets of parents, just her one, and the job that if they were not careful would take over their own lives and eventually destroy them.

The shovels broke through the dirt and with the first pile Mary heard it, the catch of breath as her brother finally let go. His sobs wounded and covered up by the sound of earth piling on top of itself. He got to their father first; she had another foot.

He pulled himself out of the shared large grave and Mary saw him pull out another flask. Of course he had another one. Except this time it didn't look like he was committing a form of heathenism, this was an actual flask. She finally heard the thump of reaching the casket.

She stopped and wiped the sweat off her face. Mary stood up straight looked at her brother, his face slightly dirty.

"Ready?" she asked.

"As I'll ever be."

They looked down at the two caskets side by side in the large grave. Mary then pulled over her leather satchel that sat right next to the grave. She opened the bag, the scent of lilacs hit her; her mother would always use the oil when doing the wash. One of the few lessons her mother taught her that did not involve anything to do with hunting.

Joe watched her pull out the sheets from her leather satchel. Closing his eyes and breathing in the scent. He could remember moments from his childhood of burying his face into his mother's neck, just breathing her in, warm and comforting – love, pure simple love.

They covered their faces with handkerchiefs bearing the same scent and in silence pulled out their parents bodies then arranged them so it looked almost as they just laying on their bed, sheets pulled over them, their coffins the mattress.

Joe got out of the grave first; he offered a hand to Mary, she waved him off and got herself out. They sprinkled the bodies with salt. Joe then took a gas can out marked snow blower. Mary smiled, that was one her thrifty father's biggest purchases. Probably one of his favorite things in fact, what he considered a good use of technology.

It was promised it to her, after one cold winter night she had helped him dig out the cars. He then showed her how to work and maintain it, then showed her exactly how to mix the gasoline with a little more oil. Her hands smelled just like her father's her mother complained and Mary couldn't help the smile that burst across her face, when he father said, "Damn right, my daughter smells like me. That proves she is going to know how to take care of herself."

Joe handed her his flask, it was rum this time, their mother's drink.

Mary pulled out the matches that they used to light the burners on the stove, her mom's favorite brand. She had no idea why and now she'd never know. The gas can was empty and set down next to her feet. Mary handed Joe a few matches and she held her own.

I love you both, thought Mary as she struck the matches and held them waiting for Joe to do the same. He held his, she nodded and may have heard a choked 'I love you' from next to her, before they both threw them into the grave. The flames appeared a strange color momentarily but it was most likely because of the gasoline mixture being different. Still one has hopes that maybe somewhere something larger than themselves was acknowledging their loss and realizing it is the world's loss.

They knew after everything was burned they would recover the grave, Joe would drive very carefully back to the house. They'd get out of the old pick-up, they'd go to their beds. That they knew.

They didn't know the future of the next morning they would wake up to see their partners put together a breakfast. Mary would finally remember her name is Sharon, that she was actually not so nervous and that she liked her. John and Joe would rib one another about being in different branches of military service. Joe saying, Marine stood for, My Ass Rides In Naval Equipment, and John saying he liked the Navy, every time there was fight, they always gave them a ride. Joe and Sharon would depart the next day. Each sibling knew it would be too hard to see one another after this, reminding one another of lives they gave up and fought hard to leave behind. So they stayed away from one another. Still cards would be exchanged on birthdays, holidays and major announcements. But they had no idea that the last hug and love you would be exchanged two days after their parent's funeral. That he would be a stranger to the last connection to what was by all intents and purposes; his sister and only known as a faceless stranger who marked empty earth.

They don't know that but for now the Campbell siblings, they never thought of one another really any other way, stood to close to the fire. Their arms around each other, the heat drying the tears to their faces.

_-Fine_

_Brothers and sisters are as close as hands and feet. ~Vietnamese Proverb_


End file.
